Centre for Strategic Marketing and Sales

KTP Case Study: MESH

Overview When innovative research agency MESH and Cranfield School of Management jointly applied for a KTP in 2010, it was the start of a true partnership which continues to this day. The partnership saw the small UK-based agency grow ten-fold in three years, winning an impressive list of new clients along the way, including Sky, the UK’s largest advertiser. This growth enabled its expansion into the US and Latin America, where clients today include LG Electronics and Delta Airlines. The initial two-year KTP was followed by a second KTP (now completed) to integrate data sources. Today the MESH-Cranfield partnership continues with a full-time Cranfield doctoral study. MESH was a small UK-based research agency with a great new method that had been developed by CEO, Fiona Blades. This new method was an innovative new insight gathering approach using mobile phones. MESH knew that what they offered was unique but did not have the analytical know-how to capitalise on it. They also needed help convincing clients to switch from their traditional research providers to a completely new way of gathering insight. The Cranfield team set about addressing this need, firstly through piloting the analytics, and then recruiting a recently graduated statistician to join the project. The analytics the Associate developed quickly provided the case studies needed to convince larger clients to sign up with MESH, and in the process created a whole new market for experience tracking research. Buoyed by this success, Fiona set up a US office in 2012 and she continues to travel between New York and London as the MESH business grows. The team at Cranfield As well as creating a new market and establishing the company as a leader in experience tracking, the KTP generated impact for the marketing academics, Cranfield’s Professor Hugh Wilson and Professor Emma Macdonald. This includes a cover article in the influential Harvard Business Review and more recently a publication in the highly rated academic Journal of Retailing . The academic team have taken these learnings into the classroom, with content delivered across multiple Masters and doctoral-level programmes, as well as in executive training here in the UK and abroad.